Restored- Part I

Whew. Over a year since I’ve been here. A lot can happen in a year. I finished a manuscript, am on the hunt for an agent, even traveled with my kids for a couple of weeks. But since my post The Other Side https://wordpress.com/view/i2ameverywoman.wordpress.com, I lost an incredible man, my father. For a while, my life was unreal. I functioned, but I wasn’t living. The one man in my life who showed me unconditional love, was gone.

Within two weeks, my divorced was finalized and I also lost the first man I ever loved. But as much as I wanted to make it all about me, my daughters’ parents divorced and they lost their grandfather. I had to be their rock and comforter.

As time went on, I put a wall around myself. The pain of losing my father and divorcing my husband, was almost crippling. I made a vow to protect myself. Never again would I entertain the thought of love. I was a wonderful mother and maybe, just maybe, that’s all God wanted me to be.

I love when I think back to when I make my own plans in my life. They very rarely work out the way I imagine them, but stubborn me keeps making them. So I was on this path to Aloneville, and an old friend (20+) years reached out to me. We had been in touch through Facebook and even seen each other since then, but our timing really didn’t line up to where I could handle someone in my life. I shut him out and allowed three more years to pass.

Our reconnection was instant. It was as though three years had only been three days. You see, when this man first appeared back in my life, I was at my lowest and most vulnerable. I was unemployed, living in my friend’s house, and absolutely broke. I remember our first call after 20 years like it was yesterday, but there was one thing he said that continues to ring true, “I’m a restorer. I’m here to restore you,” he said. Fast forward three years, and here we are.

As we tread lightly in the early stages of our relationship, I’ve realized relationships based on the foundations of friendship, respect and love, do not hurt. None of these qualities existed in my marriage. And when you fool yourself to think you’re in love with someone when existing in a toxic relationship, you confuse hate for love. You build walls because you now equate pain with love.

People have always said, “love hurts.” No it doesn’t. Lying, that hurts. Disrespect, that hurts. Being taken for granted, that hurts. But love. Love has never hurt me. And through all my trials and storms, love has been restored.